In my Addicted To Success post, I talked about addiction “as a human condition that affects most of us at some point in our lives. Our fixed thinking habits keep us stuck and always searching for something else or more to make our lives complete”.
What’s Your Fear?
Think about a loving new-born for a moment. They come into this world with a blank slate where fear is concerned; they have no fear. Fear is something learned through life-experiences and I will go as far as saying, it’s an element of the fuel that runs the addictive thought system. There are others but let’s concentrate on fear for now.
When we find ourselves casting our nets and hunting for something that will bring us happiness it is because we fear not having whatever it is we are searching for. Do we fear not having because we have misplaced something? If a new-born could speak, they would tell us exactly what it is.
Why Fear?
We all have impressive lists of accomplishments and successes that we’ve collected through life but still there are occasions when we don’t feel good about ourselves. We fear that something is missing or want more.
While writing this post, a song came into my head, written by Mick Jones from the band Foreigner and released in 1984. It became a worldwide hit and Jones said,
“I Want To Know What Love Is came up at three in the morning sometime in 1984. I don’t know where it came from. I consider it a gift that was sent through me. I think there was something bigger than me behind it. I’d say it was probably written entirely by a higher force”.
“I want to know what love is, I want you to show me
I want to feel what love is, I know you can show me”
(Michael Jones, 1984)
Fear is an emotion; Love is not
Admit it or not, love is something that we all crave and want. Yet we ALL already have love, even though we might not be aware of it. Love is a default setting that we arrive with. It’s preinstalled and can be found within all of us. Life experiences disconnect us from love, and we sense ‘loss’. Off we go on a quest to find the love we think we have ‘lost’. Perceived loss or not having generates fear and that becomes an addiction.
Love is not a task we can put on our To Do list. It is something we can only BE. It can’t be owned or given out. It must be lived and expressed. Its release is felt, and nothing needs to be added. It can only BE.
The problem with fear is that we are constantly reinforcing it with our thinking.
What’s Love Got To Do With It?
More songs creeping in, but Tina Turner’s song isn’t where I’m heading with this.
The fear of ‘not having’ be it love or success in business leads to challenging thinking or what some call, ‘stinking thinking’ and this type of thinking leads to adverse consequences.
Dr Wayne Dyer gave a great response to this by saying something on the lines of put yourself in a position of already having what you desire. It makes sense really, we already have love, so why not everything else we want? The challenge comes by working at not fixating on the fear of not having the material possessions that we think are going to make us happy. If we realize our love of self and all things, the rest falls into place so long as we are willing to take the practical steps to make it happen.
Until we direct our minds to let go of fear-based thinking, we will not really know ourselves and we will be forever searching for the light switch. We need to escape from the darkness by recognizing that darkness cannot hide. Night always becomes day. The light of love burns away the darkness.
Namasté
I bow to the place in you that is love, light, and joy
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I wish you a wonderful day.
Peace & Light
Steve Costello is a British Community & Youth Studies and Psychology honors graduate with over 30-years theoretical and practical experience in the Personal Development public and private sectors. He founded ExGro in 2018 with business partner, friend and clinical psychologist, Leo Faerberg.